CSA Week 17!

Romanesco will be in your vegetable share this week.

Big, visually stunning and nutty in flavor, this so called "Roman cauliflower"

comes from a huge, leafy plant that will be turned back into the soil to feed more plants.










This is a ALL SHARES week...FULL and HALF Vegetable and Fruit Shares!

 

Pick up is Thursday, October 3rd.

4-7 pm at your respective site.

 

 

 

 

 

Your Vegetable Harvest for this Week...

 

 

• Carrots with tops
• Acorn Squash (lots of recipes)
• Romanesco (Gratin or with garlic or Alla Diavola)
• Arugula
• Lettuce Heads
• Carola Potatoes (Yellow skin and flesh just like a Yukon Gold)
• Sage bunch
• Cippolini Onions (with steak and sage butter)
• Hakurei Salad Turnips (On-farm only. Off-farm will be getting these next week)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Your Fruit Harvest for this Week...
  
• Neptune Grapes
• Golden Smoothee Apples
• Seckel Pears
• Red Courtland or Empire Apples
  
  
  

CSA Week 16!

This is Chris A.
He's in charge of our wash/pack house. A big job for sure.

 He holds a few examples of the celeriac or celery root that you will receive in your share this week.

Celeriac roasts great, mashes beautifully alone or with potatoes and goes very well in fall soups.

Enjoy the delicious sweet celery flavor.

 

 

 

 

 

This is a FULL SHARES Only week...Full Vegetable and Fruit Shares!

That means only those with Fruit and FULL Vegetable shares will pick up.

Pick up is Thursday, September 26th. 4-7 pm at your respective site.

 

 

Your Vegetable Harvest for this Week...

 

 

• Gold Beets with Tops**
• Dark Purple "Nadia" Eggplant (last of the season)**
• Mildly Spicy Mustard Greens Mix 
• Spinach
• Celeriac**
• Red and Yellow Sweet Peppers**
• 2 Heads Leaf Lettuce
• Fennel Bulbs**
• Potimarron Heirloom Winter Squash**
• Small and Medium Russet Potatoes**
  
  
  ** These could all be roasted and tossed together for an extraordinary Autumn dinner.  
  Next morning, toss a handful of roasted veg into your omelet!
  
  
  
  
  
  Your Fruit Harvest for this Week...
• Jonagold Apples (Seedling Fruit)
• Bosc Pears (Seedling Fruit)
• Honeycrisp Apples (Mick Klug Farm)
• Red Courtland Apples (Mick Klug Farm)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Tania brushes tung oil onto maple rounds.
  Kevin, in the carpentry shop cut and sanded them down and the flower crew will use them to stage flower arrangments on for a special event.
  Wow, our people do a fantastic job!
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Hello Pig.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  It's time again to harvest our pork.
  Fresh pork cuts will be available within a few weeks.
  Naturally cured and smoked pork will be ready in a month.
  
  
  

CSA Week 15!

I for one am more than happy to see spinach season back!

 Early Autumn is a favorite time of year and we can't seem to get enough of the cooler season crops like spinach, leeks, and brussel's sprouts!.

Every Fall, it takes some time to grasp once again just how much slower things grow as the daylight hours dwindle and temperatures get cooler.
The water hauling, weed-killing, grass mowing battle can be stepped down a bit now. Whew!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a ALL SHARES week...FULL and HALF Vegetable and Fruit Shares!

 

Pick up is Thursday, September 19th.

4-7 pm at your respective site.

 

 

 

You Vegetable Harvest for this Week...

• Spinach

• Brussels Sprouts (removed from the stalk) (4 recipes)

• Arugula

• Green Savoy Cabbage

• Sweet Peppers

• French Fingerling Potatoes

• Leeks

• Broccoli

• Daikon Radishes (Pickled or Kimchi or Salad)

• Red Storage Onions (for On-Farm ONLY. Two weeks ago we mistakenly left these out of our On-Farm Shares...oops.)
  
  
  
  

Your Fruit Harvest for this Week...

• Arava Melon (Grown here at TFO! Sweet, tropical green flesh) 

• D'Anjou Pears (Mick Klug Farm)

• Mars Grapes (Mick Klug Farm) 

• Empire Apples (Mick Klug Farm)

  
  
  
   

 Early Autumn look around the farm.

 

Our Allis Chalmers G cultivating tractor waking.

No it's not an alien ship landing at midnight to abduct an innocent farmer. 

It's once again, the sun rising in the east to warm and feed our world!

 

 

 

The sun and Kyle.

 

 

 

 

L-O-W Clouds.

We gave in this year and grew a vegetable rarely eaten. You know, those round,
orange things you see so much of starting about this time every year...
Yep, those. We grew a bunch of those!









We had quite a few extra hands quickly working this Saturday
 in the first of 2 or 3 mass potato harvests.














Come see us soon and look how beautifully
the flower bouquets
have changed
for the Fall!


Go TFO Flower Team











Please stop by and see us to purchase farm grown products...

 
*Every Thursday 4 - 7 pm on the farm



*Every Saturday 8 am - 2 pm on the farm 



*Every Sunday 10 am - 3 pm at the Logan Square Farmers Market
 
*Every first and third Sunday of the month
           May 5 through October 20, 2013 9 am - 3 pm at Chicago Botanic Garden
 
 







Eat Well, Eat Local and Thank You!

CSA Week 14!

On the left are Red Hungarian Peppers. On the right are Red and Yellow Italian 'Corno di Toro' or

Horn of the Bull peppers.
All three varieties are sweet, thick walled and really delicious roasted or raw!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a FULL SHARES Only week...Full Vegetable and Fruit Shares!

That means only those with Fruit and FULL Vegetable shares will pick up.

Pick up is Thursday, September 12th. 4-7 pm at your respective site.

 

 

 

 

 

Your Vegetable Harvest for this Week...

 

• Sweet Peppers
• San Marzano Tomatoes (Great Italian Sauce Tomato)
  Sadly, this will be the one and only time this season that this super-fantastic San Marzano variety will show itself. With tons of hard work and some luck, next year will yield far more of these babies. 
• Heirloom and Hoophouse Tomatoes
• Green Beans
• Sweet Corn
• Lettuce Mix
• Green Kohlrabi
• Eggplant
• French Fingerling Potatoes
•  Broccoli

Your Fruit Harvest for this Week...

• Small 'Tasty Bites' cantaloupes (Grown here at TFO!) 

• Red Courtland Apples (Seedling Fruit)

• Stanley Plums (Mick Klug Farm)

• Honey Crisp Apples (Mick Klug Farm)
  
  

CSA Week 13!

Freshly dug "LaRatte" fingerling potatoes.
These waxy style potatoes roast or boil beautifully.
Check out this potato salad recipe.

 

 

 

 

 

Check out the farm stand and you can meet our 5 other varieties of potatoes!

 

 

 

 

This is a ALL SHARES week...FULL and HALF Vegetable and Fruit Shares!

 

Pick up is Thursday, September 5th.

4-7 pm at your respective site.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your Vegetable Harvest for this Week...

 

Michelle helps to set up the tomato display at the market.

 

• Heirloom Tomatoes 
• Green Romano Beans (Flat, Italian beans. Just like green beans)
  
• Cilantro
• Red Beets with Tops
• Scarlet Salad Turnips
• Cucumber (last of the season)
• Red Radishes
• Garlic Bulbs
• Red Storage Onions

 

 

 

 

 

 

The significant lack of rain in August made for some concentrated, sweet melons!
Notice how the grass however does not care for the dry weather.

 

Your Fruit Harvest for this Week...

 

•  Arava Melons (Galia type with sweet green flesh) Grown here at TFO!

• Sarah's Choice Cantaloupes (Fantastic, aromatic orange flesh) Grown here at TFO!

• Golden Supreme Apples (Mick Klug Farm)

• Jupiter Grapes (seedless and the last of the season Mick Klug Farm)

• Peaches (late summer variety Mick Klug Farm)
  
  
  
  

Pick up a 2 lb. bag of freshly ground whole wheat flour and some melon for

a superb pancake breakfast...or dinner for that matter!
We have freshly ground corn meal as well, also available in 2 lb. bags.

CSA Week 12!

One of the sweet benefits of being a farm kid.

  Charlie waits in the distance for his big brother Eddie to gorge

himself with perfectly ripe watermelon directly from the field.

We have more melons for you in this week's fruit share.

 

 

 

Charlie has become quite the passionate insect finder and catcher.
Another benefit of farm life.
He can take or leave watermelon but grasshoppers, millipedes and worms...that's real fun!

 

This is a FULL SHARES week...Full Vegetable and Fruit Shares!

That means only those with Fruit and FULL Vegetable shares will pick up.

Pick up is Thursday, August 29th. 4-7 pm at your respective site.

 

 

 

 

 

Your Vegetable Harvest for this Week...

 

 

• Heirloom and Slicer Tomatoes
• Cherry Tomatoes (mix of three!) 
• Sweet Peppers
• Basil
• Lettuce Mix
• Cucumbers
• Cipollini Onions (Italian, flat roasting onions)
• Zucchini
• Parsley (Italian Flat Leaf)
• Curly Green Kale
  
  

CSA Week 11!

Early, chilly, foggy.

A very atypical August morning looking over the Brussels sprouts, leeks and popcorn.

We are currently back to a little normal summer weather for now.

Lets wait and see what next week brings. Ugh!  

 

 

 

 

 

This is a ALL SHARES week...FULL and HALF Vegetable and Fruit Shares!

 

Pick up is Thursday, August 22nd.

4-7 pm at your respective site.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your Vegetable Harvest for this Week...

Peter and Joe harvest hoop house basil.

Carefully pinching the top set of leaves gives you the best, most tender basil and encourages the plants to produce more.

Our basil grows so well in our hoophouse, we usually don't plant it in the field at all.

• Fresh Basil
• Hoop House and Field Tomatoes**
• Lettuce Mix
• Broccoli
• Eggplant
• Large, Red Beets without tops 
• Dark Red Norland Potatoes
• Zucchini
• Mild, Sweet Onions
  
  
  
  **Our field tomatoes have suffered quite a bit from disease due in part to the very cool evenings we have had this August. Sadly, our field tomato season will be a very short one.
  I know, it is heart breaking to hear especially when the work required to maintain that crop is so substantial.
  Take heart. Our hoop house crop is growing strong and we wont give up without a fight!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I just had to show you this shot of my favorite farm creature.
Sporting a beautiful shade of bright summer green, he is a sure sign that autumn is fast approaching.

 

 

 

 

Your Fruit Harvest for this Week...

 

• Blacktail Mountain Watermelon (grown here at TFO!) 
• Goldenrod Seedless Grapes (Mick Klug Farm)
• Ozark Plums (Mick Klug Farm)
• Cantaloupe (sweet, orange flesh. Seedling Fruit)

 

 

*Our 5th Annual Farm Tour went really well and we had

a great turnout.

Take a look at some of the handsomest folks we saw that day...

 

Tania
gives everybody the overview in the cool of our big market tent.
She kept everybody cool as well with her cucumber and Thai basil ice water.
You aint had water till you had Tania's water.
You go water girl!

 

 

 

Looking at the chickens looking at us.

 

 

 

 

 

Larry,
 Tempel Farms manager and grandson of Tempel Smith points

us in the direction of his ever growing fertility project. His compost yard!
A few years ago, he started with a few experimental windrows and is now regularly
turning (ha ha) out huge mountains of black gold!
Made with ingredients entirely from the farm, we spread this precious stuff on all our vegetable
and flower fields. Lucky us!

Everybody taking a walk across Millburn Rd. to where things grow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do the Onion Walk.
Out of the greenhouse and into the field.
All these onions are now safely in the greenhouse to finish curing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Three lovely faces in the sunshine!
And more on the hill.

 

Get in line for a quick cool off!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kale.
 Probably the most stereotypical CSA farm crop.

 But hey...it's good!
And it was free this day.

 

 

 

Thank you all for coming and sharing your morning with us.
If you couldn't make it this year, we will see you next year!